They do this everywhere they’re big and backed up with subsidies. They pioneered the marketing strategy of forcing schools to buy their product (it’s a guaranteed market).
As more and more people wake up to the effects of Big Ag and start asking questions about things like (real) nutrition as well as climate change and fossil fuel usage, and as things like vat grown meat come online, more people pick up veg*nism, I fully expect more ridiculous “culture war” stuff being ratcheted up by the unhinged far right. They’ve already tie up so much of their identity in things like eating way, way, way too much meat and consuming way too much dairy.
I expect their behavior to only get worse. And of course, it will be well-funded. The average wanna-be-macho magabrain idiot won’t know that they are just pawns on the chessboard. The magabrain men especially think that they’ll become women if they stop eating meat.
Yes, I should have included that explicit reference in this post, too. I referenced it elsewhere on this thread. I fully expect more states to do this kind of performative lunacy (well, it’s performative on one level, but it’s also about the lobbying I’d wager). I know Florida and Alabama outright banned it (apparently Tennessee was considering it) and that Iowa signed something to prohibit schools from buying it.
And that’s just lab-grown meat. The nonsense over almond, soy, oat, etc., and whether it can be allowed to be called milk is another.
And that’s not even getting into the attitudes that prevail even in an age where everyone has the power of Internet search at their fingertips when it comes to nutrition. I cannot tell you how many people get looks of concern when they learn I’m vegetarian - they seem to genuinely believe I’m putting my life at risk (lol) by not consuming massive amounts of meat. Almost always, they proceed to ask how I get my protein (sigh). This level of ignorance cannot be a mere accident, but I do think the tide is slowly, very slowly, turning.
But in that same conversation if you tell people that even though you are not strictly vegan, you don’t try to “make up” for being vegetarian by consuming toxic amounts of dairy and eggs, again, it’s not uncommon to get lectured by someone with Dunning Kruger’s on how this is not a diet that can sustain health (again, lol).
The ridiculous amount of propaganda about the benefits of consuming way too much dairy being forced onto school children is a great example of regulatory capture.
I mean, if given the stark choice of drinking soda or drinking milk (or, lol, chocolate milk), it’s probably better to drink milk. But that’s not really much of a choice…and our health system is groaning under this kind of thing. This is like back in the 50s when doctors would tell you that smoking is GOOD for you, and they could even say it in advertisements.
But this is like the McDonald’s plan of advertising - get them while they’re young and you have a customer for life. Even better if they are a captive audience like in public schools.
I just checked my local regular and soy milk nutritional tables. Per 200ml of milk, there is 6,8 grams of protein for regular and 6,6 grams of protein for soy. Soy is one of the vegan milks with most protein and it’s really delicious too.They also add a bunch of vitamins along with the calcium.
There is a good comparison there and soy milk is just simply better.
When I was in school, every child who purchased a school lunch from the cafeteria was legally required to be given the choice of milk, chocolate milk, or soy milk.
We even had a “local” farm who had a contract with the school district to have milk vending machines that sold 20 ounce bottles of strawberry, mocha, etc milks. That lasted until the district signed a contract with Pepsi, who was then granted the right to have their beverages be the only drinks to be sold in vending machines.
It’s really sad the way so many Americans even still hold so many goofy ideas about nutrition.
The number of people that believe there is some kind of protein (and fat) deficiency going on in America, I tell ya…it’s to the point where even some menus now tell you how many grams of protein are in this or that, as if protein is some kind of superfood. All it makes me think of is all the tools saying “it’s got electrolytes!” in Idiocracy.
And when it comes to things like milk (and steak. or hamburgers, etc.) things get positively ridiculous. I bet it gets a whole lot dumber for as long as Republicans have any semblance of power in any state in this country. Two states have banned vat grown meat, because of “wokeness” <- well, that is what they tell their dumbass supporters, but it’s probably due to lobbyist money. Some people want to regulate what is called “milk”, giving the same kind of reasons (stick it to the “soy boys”).
It’s also helpful if you’re on a specific diet and can see the breakdown. Example being putting on muscle, you’re supposed to eat 1.2g per lb you weigh to help gain muscle mass (obviously while doing the required work).
Milk doesn’t have to be inhumane. We’ve just traded local small farms that cared for their animals and delivered locally with corporate conglomerates who want to maximize profit at the expense of their herd.
The Leather industry in India accounts for around 13% of the world’s leather production of hides/skins and handles a robust annual production of about 3 Bn sq. ft. of leather.
The industry is known for its consistency in high export earnings and it is among the top ten foreign exchange earners for the country.
India has an abundance of raw materials with access to 21% of world’s cattle and buffalo and 11% of the world’s goat and sheep population.
I used to think this too, but I learned that milk-producing cows are artificially inseminated every year to keep them producing milk. They only live 4-6 years because of the immense strain this puts on their bodies, after which they’re eaten. Cows naturally live 15-20 years. Even the process of getting them pregnant involves shoving your whole arm up their rectum–it’s really horrible to watch.
All dairy farms are inhumane. Some are worse than others. No cow gets a normal, full life.
That’s 2-3x longer than cows raised for meat from what I understand. That may sound inhumane either way depending on your perspective, but doesn’t mean that they’re treated poorly while alive.
In the end they are still killed when its not worth the time of the farmers. You’re either killed for meat, or killed when you’re done making milk.
It might be more humane, but the better option is “Don’t breed animals just to kill them in a few years.” It’s better but the solution for ending the pain is preventing it ever happening in the first place.
No life is without pain. We may have fundamental differences in how we view inhumanity, and while I’m sure neither of us want anything to suffer, it’s the end of life that we may disagree. Death doesn’t have to be inhumane or painful though.
I agree no life is without pain, it’s why I think breeding just to have milk or meat is immoral and unethical. I don’t want an industrial scale level pain factory that increases global warming because I want a steak or a glass of milk.
A life is not born just to die as a song is not begun just to end, the life itself is the beauty of nature. I don’t think a humane way of killing someone or something justifies a life trapped in a machine to be slaughtered when ripe.
I want to make it clear I eat animal products, due to my family wanting it more than I do. I had a meatloaf today of ground beef, I don’t claim to be a moral high ground when I clearly am not.
But I don’t think that even if the death is humane, the purpose of life is not be a product to be sold, for humans, cattle, pigs, dogs, cats, horses, fish, bears, etc. I would object if humans were in the same placement.
Pretty sure humans didn’t just decide that all herd grazing animals on earth should be dumb as rocks. We are powerful but we don’t have the ability to time travel.
Yes, that’s true, but all I’m saying is that animal husbandry changes what traits are selected for and intelligence isn’t one of them that we’re selecting for.
Sorry for not translating the whole Wikipedia article, but TLDR this is how high quality dairy is produced in Poland, where everyone from smallest to larger farms can cooperate and coexist.
30 years ago there was even this now non-existent elaborate network of milk collection and delivery (we have shops now :p) - every morning there was a transport organized through every small or large village where everyone farmer even with only one cow could sell the milk. As the number of such farmers went rapidly down this has stopped being done.
Of course you can still find big corp dairy products in the stores (Nestle? Danone?) but they have a hard time competing and I am not sure but they still might buy their supplies from polish cooperatives.
For some reasons my wife became lactose intolerant, so we started to buy regular milk and lactose free milk. Then, we learned about oat milk and went all in on it, never bought cow milk again. Before I knew, I became lactose intolerant too.
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